We just acquired (i.e., bought) a cool old amp, a 1961 Silvertone Model 1474, labeled as a "Reverberation Twin Twelve".  This old amp is cosmetically clean, no grill damage, and the tolex is about 95% good.

Back in 1961, this was the top of the line for Silvertones, and the very first Silvertone amp to have reverb. Built for Sears by Danelectro, this amp used four 6L6 tubes to push 60 watts of raw energy through a pair of 12 inch Jensen blue label speakers. This amp still has the original Silvertone branded tubes in it. The Sears catalog listed this amp at $139.95, which was also the most expensive amp Silvertone had offered up until that time.  The Model 1474 ceased production in the fall of 1962, a scant year after it first hit the market.

For years, I've had an old baritone ukulele tucked away in my closet at home.  It has an uncertain pedigree, since the name sticker disappeared long before I got the uke. Based on appearance, I'd say it's probably a Harmony, or maybe a Kay.  It wasn't a high dollar instrument when it was born, and not much has improved for the old dog since then.

I got it out of the case about a year ago, put new strings on the old uke, stretched them out, retuned it, and started to play. Then, I retuned it, and started to play.  Then, I retuned it, and ............ well, I put it away in frustration. The dang thing would not stay in tune. Seems the ukulele had its original tuners on it, the same style of tuners every ukulele made for 75 years had when it left the factory.  Friction tuners (aka banjo pegs, or violin pegs; see the one on the left) frequently will not stay in tune. There are various treatments for this condition, but most of them involve further frustration and grinding of teeth.  I've never enjoyed that sort of recurring frustration, and I decided to either fix the problem, or chunk the uke.  Something had to give.

I brought the offending uke to Tony, who immediately knew what to do.  In a fairly short period of time, he removed the old friction tuners, resized the holes in the headstock, and installed new Grover ukulele machine heads.  Wow!  What a difference a new set of machine heads make. Now the old dog is an old darling.  Not only does she stay in tune, she looks ten years younger, thanks to a thorough fretboard cleaning and polish.  (See the finished product at left.)

The best part of the whole process is that, for less than the price of a night out, my useless uke became a styling ride.

Give Tony at call at 662-323-3824, and see what he can do for your ukulele, or guitar, or bass, or mandolin, or whatever you've got that you don't play because it frustrates you.   You just might be amazed at what a huge return you can get from a small investment.

Bryan Owings, renowned Nashville musician and bon vivant, dropped by recently to leave his 1958 Fender Pro Amp(complete with tweed cabinet) with Tony for a sound makeover.  Mostly what the amp needed was to have the original speaker re-coned to original Fender specs, and the transformer rewound to exactly match the original transformer output. When all was said and done, we knew, for once, exactly why Fender marked all the chicken head knobs on this amp 1-12 instead of 1-10.  "10" just ain't got enough room for all the sound that comes out of this tan monkey.

Our thanks to Bryan for letting us share this photo of a great looking amplifier, his 1958 Fender Tweed Pro Amp.

At Backstage, we frequently forget to mention one of our most popular products and services, and that's stage lighting.

The newest addition to the Backstage Music fleet of lighting options is LED lighting.  Yes, you read that right:  LED lighting.

In the past, stage lighting has usually meant rows of heavy light fixtures (parcans) hung from light trees, colored gels that had to be changed frequently, bulbs that burned out at the most inopportune time, etc. With the advent of new LED technology, we now stock two different LED lighting rigs (one large, one small) that can change the way you light your stage.

The new LED light rigs are light weight (each LED can weights less than one conventional parcan), use very little power (no more tripped breakers), are maintenance free (each LED has a 100,000 hour lifespan), offer brilliant, consistent light, and thanks to the included DMX controller, each LED rig can offer up to 16.7 million different colors.  That's not a misprint, folks  16.7 million colors.

Each light rig includes four LED cans, tripod stand, crossbar tree, all necessary cables, lighting controller, and power center.  The only other thing you need to make this work is a standard wall outlet.

I was going to tell you all about the specs on these rigs, but decided instead to ask our readers to drop by the store and see these rigs in operation.  You can see the DMX controller, test out the sound activation features, and just generally amaze yourself with this new frontier in stage lighting.  Come on by, check it out, and light up your life.